Missourinet Mornings–Greetings from Atlanta

Hello from Atlanta. After a ten-hour drive and a long day on Thursday, I’m refreshed and ready for what’s about to get crazy here in downtown Atlanta. Fans from Missouri will be arriving later today and early this afternoon the football team will arrive.

After a short press conference by head coach Gary Pinkel, the team will do a short walk-through and head back to their hotel.

Keep checking back at Missourinet.com. I’ll have pics, video and audio from the press conference. Plus I’ll try to sneak around the dome and get some behind the scenes looks too.

The big story yesterday was Mizzou head coach Gary Pinkel saying that he was not interested in job opening at Washington. He appeared on ESPN’s Mike and Mike,

Director of Athletics Mike Alden released a statement as well. You can read that below the video

Mike Alden–“We are excited for the opportunity to play in the SEC Championship Game, and so proud of Coach Pinkel, his staff and our student-athletes. All of us are focused on the game and Auburn this weekend. I know our fans and all of Tiger Nation are energized to be a part of this special event.

At the same time, it’s also important to recognize the tremendous job Coach Pinkel has done throughout all of his efforts at Mizzou. We have the #1 APR rate in the SEC, and we have remarkable results academically and socially. Competitively, Coach Pinkel has won at a very high level with discipline, integrity, dignity and compassion. We have won 10 or more games four times in the past seven years and have won four divisional championships in that same period. Gary and I have spoken about our continued efforts going forward. I’m looking forward to sitting down with Gary after the season and focus on ways to build on these successes and recognize the significant contributions Gary and his staff have made to our program. We are so pleased with Gary’s commitment to Mizzou and I look forward to working with Gary for a long time.”